Putin foe Khodorkovsky meets family a free man in Berlin
Berlin (AFP) - Russia's former richest man and ardent Kremlin critic Mikhail Khodorkovsky was reunited Saturday with his family after his surprise early release from a Russian prison and lightning transfer to Germany.
A day after he was whisked away from his prison camp in a remote corner of northern Russia, Khodorkovsky was ensconced in one of the most luxurious hotels in the German capital.
The extraordinary operation was worked out behind the scenes with the German government and came about after negotiations between German former foreign minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
After meeting the 50-year-old ex-oil tycoon for more than an hour, Germany's Greens MP Marieluise Beck said his return to Russia was "not on the agenda" but added that she had no mandate to talk about his plans.
Khodorkovsky's ailing mother Marina whom the former oil baron had asked to see in his appeal to Putin flew in from Moscow several hours later, greeting Khodorkovsky with a gentle smile and a light tap on his left shoulder as she gingerly stepped out of a chauffeur-driven car.
Released on Friday after 10 years behind bars, Khodorkovsky will give his first news conference on Sunday near the Cold War symbol, Check Point Charlie, a well-known crossing point from East to West Berlin.
He told Moscow's The New Times in a brief segment of an interview posted on the opposition magazine's website that he had only a few chances to see his wife Inna in the past 10 years.
"Once in every three months -- for four years out of the 10 -- I was allowed to spend the night in the meeting room," said Khodorkovsky as he leaned back in an armchair while still sporting an inmate's buzzcut and looking a few pounds underweight.
Russia's 'Solzhenitsyn'
Khodorkovsky, widely seen as Russia's most famous post-Soviet inmate, was jailed for financial crimes in separate convictions in 2005 and 2010, but his supporters said he was being punished for daring to finance the opposition.
He had been due for release in August 2014.
Putin shocked Russia on Thursday by saying that, after a decade behind bars, his fierce opponent had turned to him for a pardon on humanitarian grounds, citing his 79-year-old mother's ill health.
Less than 24 hours later, Khodorkovsky was granted the pardon, walked out of prison in a region near the border with Finland and flew to Berlin on a private jet organised by Genscher.
Prison officials said Khodorkovsky had requested to fly to Germany, where his mother, who has cancer, had undergone treatment before.
With Russia and the world eagerly waiting to learn of Khodorkovsky's plans, a German analyst who helped with his transfer said the former oligarch would likely stay out of politics but could become a high-profile public figure and moral authority.
"He could take upon himself the role of (Alexander) Solzhenitsyn," Alexander Rahr, who acted as an interpreter for Genscher, told AFP, referring to the former Soviet dissident and Nobel-prize winning author.
Rahr said that Genscher had asked him to support the mediation with the Russian authorities two and a half years ago, adding that he had helped translate letters. Not even his wife knew of the effort, he added.
'He is free to return'
The dizzying suddenness of Khodorkovsky's release led some observers to suggest that Russia's once most famous prisoner might have been forced into exile amid attempts by the Kremlin to touch up his country's dismal rights record ahead of the Winter Olympics it is hosting in February.
But Putin's spokesman dismissed such speculation.
"He is free to return to Russia. Absolutely," Dmitry Peskov told AFP on Saturday. He declined to say whether any conditions were attached to his release or whether he would be free to participate in politics.
Khodorkovsky said in his first official statement on Friday that his request for a pardon did not amount to an admission of guilt.
He said he planned "to repay my debts" to family but did not divulge any other details.
US Secretary of State John Kerry welcomed the release but urged Moscow to do more to improve the rule of law.
Two jailed members of the Pussy Riot punk band are expected to be freed under an amnesty that comes less than two months before the Olympic Games start in Sochi.
Thirty Greenpeace activists, arrested on hooliganism charges after a protest against Arctic oil drilling, are also expected to escape prosecution.
Khodorkovsky's release drew the curtain on Russia's highest profile criminal case, which has harmed the investment climate and become a symbol of the persecution of Kremlin enemies.
The Kommersant broadsheet, citing sources, said Khodorkovsky had decided to seek a pardon after a meeting with representatives of Russia's security services, who had warned about a possible third criminal case against him while reminding him of his mother's worsening health.
